


Rolling Thunder

by Ieznos



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Young Avengers (Comics)
Genre: Family Bonding, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-16
Updated: 2019-03-16
Packaged: 2019-07-13 04:08:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,486
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16009976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ieznos/pseuds/Ieznos
Summary: Busting a HYDRA base should’ve been a quick affair, but when sensors in the Iron Man armor noticed a blur shooting out of the crumbling compound things got...complicated.Two boys who look too much like Wanda to be a coincidence are taken in by the Avengers to learn about how to be heroes themselves. But where did they come from, and how did HYDRA get to them? Too many unanswered questions leads to digging too deep, and a new threat emerges that even the Avengers may not be able to handle on their own.[The overplayed concept of Young Avengers in the MCU]





	1. A Questionable Rescue

**Author's Note:**

> Wow hi I still write things yeah. I've been working on this for a while now but only recently found the motivation to finish it, or the first chapter at least. It's still not perfect but I've done all I can for now. Hope you enjoy it either way.

The door was open.

The door was  _never_ open.

“Billy come _on_ , we have to go!” Tommy urged his brother towards the exit. They had never seen it devoid of any sort of guard before. They had never seen a ceiling collapse on their rooms before either though. Today was filled with a lot of firsts.

“But we’re not supposed to leave, Tommy! We’ll get in trouble,” Billy protested weakly. Last time they had tried to escape it had ended...badly. He didn’t want to see Tommy with his leg bent like that again.

“It’s different this time, we can make it outside! Don’t you want to be free?”

Billy hesitated a moment longer, looking down the seemingly abandoned hallway one last time as the world shook around them.

“Okay. Let’s go.”

\----------------------------------------

_Tell me,_

_William._

_The                                t r u t h ,,,_

_now._

_Don’t_

**_[[L I E T O M E]]_ **

_\--Are you]]_

_\---_

**_H  u m  a n ?_ **

 

Billy woke slowly at first, squinting against the bright lights overhead. He groaned weakly, lifting an arm up to shield his eyes and vaguely feeling a pulling sensation from an IV inserted into his hand. He was dimly aware of hushed voices next to him slowly stopping as he shifted around. Great, now they knew he was awake.

"Are you back with us?" A voice asked tentatively, and Billy moved his hand down to look at the man speaking. Judging by the lab coat the man was a doctor, with black curly hair and glasses sitting on his nose. What was Billy doing passed out with a doctor? Did one of the tests go too far? Was he dying? Oh god, was he finally going to die?

He must have made a noise of confusion because the voice returned, louder this time, "How're you feeling?"

That was strange, the doctors didn't usually speak to him, much less ask how he was feeling. This whole thing felt strange.

"You were in pretty rough shape earlier, you had completely exhausted yourself before we managed to get you and your brother out of that old building-“

Billy shot up as the man's words began to sink in. His _brother_ . Oh my god, how had he forgotten about Tommy!? Where was he? What did they do to him? He had to find him! Fragments of memories came back to Billy as he ripped the IV out of his hand, hastily clambering off the bed he had been laying on while a set of hands attempted to hold him down. There was an explosion, they had escaped, they were lost, and Tommy was tired, he was _so tired, Billy_.

The machine next to Billy’s bed screeched in protest as he pulled on the wires and Billy wished it would just _shut up shut up shut up already_. With a spark, the glass on the machine splintered and shattered, finally falling silent.

More people quickly filed into the room and Billy could distantly hear himself screaming, sobbing, begging the people in front of him but none of them would listen. They never listened. His legs became tangled in the blanket previously covering him and he couldn't _move_ . He couldn’t _breathe_ . The lights overhead flickered dangerously and Billy could feel the sparks just underneath his skin. The voices tried to calm him with soothing words, telling him that he's fine now, he's safe, they rescued him, but their meanings were lost to the struggling boy. Until suddenly, the hands were gone; Almost all of them at least. He blearily registered the face of a woman who picked him up, and suddenly Billy felt like he was flying. His world spun around him in a mess of too bright lights and strange faces until- _Tommy_.

"He's right here," the woman soothed, setting Billy down just for the boy to collapse onto his knees moments later, all the strength flooding out of him. Billy choked back a sob and reached out a shaking hand to lay on his brother’s chest. He's alive. He's breathing. He's right here.

"He'll be fine, but you need to lay down now so you can be fine too, okay?" Billy nodded numbly at the woman's words, somehow managing to stand on trembling legs and climb in to lay on the bed next to his twin. His twin whom he had almost forgotten about. He could hear someone grumbling about how they should be laying separately, and that cramming the two of them together on one bed like that can't _possibly_ be comfortable, but the woman shushed them. Billy liked her, most of the handlers weren't nice.

He could feel his eyelids drooping, he was still exhausted after using so much of his power. What had he been using it for again? Billy couldn't remember, and quite frankly he didn't care. Tommy was right next to him, subconsciously moving closer to his brother's body for warmth and comfort, and nothing else mattered. Something in Billy's head told him he was going to be okay, they were both going to be okay now. For some reason, he believed it.

Billy fell asleep to the quiet hum of the lights above him and hushed arguing somewhere further away. With an arm slung over his brother's chest and his previously discarded blanket being placed over his body, Billy felt right for the first time in forever.

—

Billy couldn’t remember the last time he slept so long. He felt like he was drifting down the stream of his own mind, able to feel the world around him but not strong enough to pull himself out and into consciousness. The voices had come and gone as time passed. How much time had passed anyway? Billy couldn’t tell. Sometimes he could hear snippets of the conversations happening around him, but they never made any sense.

 _...Have to do_ something _with them, Steve…_

_...Don’t you…...last time..._

_...looks like...I know……_

_...But they’re just kids...can’t be much harm..._

People, voices, names, things he had never heard of before. The logical part of Billy’s mind told him to pay attention, file away the information for later, use it against his enemies, but the tired part of his mind decided it was much better to not care. Sleep was his top priority right now.

His limbs felt heavy and his head felt fuzzy, a blue mist swirled behind his eyelids that was much nicer to look at than those harsh lights and white walls.

\--

Steve sighed as he waited for Tony to finish decrypting the files they’d managed to get from the Hydra base. There was nothing he hated more than feeling useless, but Steve knew it was better to leave the technological aspects to his friend. They’d managed to get the basic files on the two boys down in the medical wing, but Steve needed more information. He needed to know exactly what Hydra did to those kids, and what he could do to get them home.

Tony let out a frustrated growl and threw his hands into the air as yet another error code flashed across the screen, “This is ridiculous! There’s no way these were coded by Hydra! I’ve always been able to crack their files easy peasy and all of a sudden it’s like an ant trying to get over the Great Wall of China!”

“Should I run the next program, boss?” FRIDAY’s mechanical voice filtered through the ceiling.

“Yeah, keep going until you get something,” Tony moved to walk out of the room and motioned for Steve to follow. The two slowly made their way down the hall of the Avengers Compound, the wall of windows providing them with a view of the rain pouring down outside. Everything about today seemed gloomy.

Steve sighed, “Hydra wouldn’t hide something this well unless it were important.”

“That’s exactly what I’m worried about. Don’t pretend you aren’t feeling a bit of deja vu here, Rogers,” Tony responded, stopping to lean against the glass.

It had been a long week for the team. Busting a Hydra base should’ve been a quick affair, but when sensors in the Iron Man armor noticed a blur shooting out of the crumbling compound things got...complicated.

Wanda had been hysterical, demanding they track down whatever it was the second she heard about it over the com links. She was hoping beyond belief that her brother had come back from the grave, but no such luck. As it turned out, the blurry something was actually _two_ somethings, and they weren’t very keen on being found.

It took far too long to finally corner the two runaways in an abandoned automotive factory close to the Russian border. The two boys had been so...small when the team found them, curled up together in the back of an old storage closet and shivering on the cold concrete. There hadn’t been much of a debate on what to do with them, they obviously needed medical attention and the Avengers Compound was the best place to get it.

They mistakenly thought the two twins were unconscious, and got a nasty surprise when the dark haired one blasted a hole straight through the wall with some sort of blue lightning after they tried to pick him up. Luckily Thor was a sturdy guy, and the kid passed out right after the fact. They both stayed out cold for the entire trip back to the compound, and then for another day after that.

“SHIELD’s asking for answers,” Steve said, ignoring Tony’s statement.

“You’re the leader, _you_ tell them something.”

 “Tell them _what_? That we have two kids we know nothing about in the med bay that could level a mountain? That Hydra has files so advanced that even you haven’t been able to crack them? That’s not going to go over well.”

Tony shrugged, “Then tell them something else, you know, spin the story.”

“How so?”

“Like...the anomaly has been taken care of, the Avengers initiative has two new trainees, I’m making a new system specifically made for cracking highly advanced encryptions in under a minute…”

“Are you doing that?” Steve asked.

“I am now.”

\--

The second time Billy woke up it was to his brother screaming in rage. He realized someone was trying to pull him away from Tommy, resulting in the white haired boy latching onto Billy hard enough to leave bruises on his arms. Billy struck out with his legs, landing a solid hit to the thigh of the man behind him.

"Ow! Okay, okay, calm down!" The man let go of Billy, and Tommy immediately pulled his brother back against his chest. In a flash the two were across the room before Tommy crashed into a wall, nearly dropping Billy in the process.

Billy gently pushed on Tommy’s chest to be let down before the other boy dropped him, it would be easier to use his powers like this anyway. More people had begun filing into the room at the sound of the commotion, and Billy quickly let his instincts take over as he fell into a defensive stance. He recognized some of the people from earlier, but none seemed to be the woman who had picked him up. It seems the nice one wasn’t here this time.

"Woah, hey, we were just trying to move you so we could reapply your bandages. We didn't mean to freak you out," The man Billy kicked made a move to approach them again, raising his hands in a placating nature, “Let’s just introduce ourselves, talk this out, and _not_ blow any holes into the walls.”

The tense silence remained in the room for several seconds before the man tried again, “I’ll go first then. My name is Clint, okay? What’s yours?”

The twins remained silent, warily eyeing the man - ‘Clint’ - in front of them. Tommy’s eyes flickered back to the blocked door and the horde of people in front of it. He didn’t have a lot of room to build up speed, but maybe if he caught them off guard he could force his way through the crowd and out into the open and-

“Do you two speak English?” Clint pressed, interrupting any thoughts of an escape plan, “Can you understand what I’m saying?”

Billy let out an irritated huff. Of course they all thought he was stupid and slow and worthless and-

“Can _you_ take a hint?” Tommy retorted from his spot behind his brother, “We aren’t looking to make friends.”

Billy watched the man’s eyebrows raise up in surprise at the snarky attitude. Clearly he didn’t know Tommy. More importantly, he clearly wasn’t a handler. What was going on then?

“That’s a lot of attitude considering we saved your _lives_ back at the factory you know-“

“That’s enough, Clint,” A redheaded woman interrupted, breaking away from the group to stand next to the irritated archer, “You’re clearly not good with kids.”

The man let out a sharp laugh before stepping back to let the woman take over. Billy wondered what was so funny.

“Look, I know you two are probably scared right now, but you’re hurt and we just want to help. You were with Hydra for a long time, right?”

“Is this...not Hydra?” Billy asked warily. He could feel Tommy jab him in the back- _Don’t let them question your loyalty-_ but it was better to ask sooner rather than later. If it was Hydra they’d be punished for asking, but if it wasn’t Hydra...Billy didn’t know what would happen. What was there besides Hydra and their enemies? Surely their enemies would be even worse?

“Of course we’re not Hydra!” Clint scoffs, “I’ve never been more offended in my _life_ ,”

The woman turns around to silence Clint with a glare before turning back to the boys, “Why don’t you two just lay back down and get some more rest,” She gestures to the two stiff beds against the wall, “We can bring you some food.”

The door is still blocked, and laying down sounds nice, and food sounds even better. Billy looks over his shoulder to catch Tommy’s eye. The other boy is clearly still exhausted, the bags under his eyes are just as prominent as Billy remembered, but the stubborn set of his jaw made it clear that he wasn’t going to comply to a nap so easily.

“We can’t do anything like this…” Billy whispered, “It’s better to rest while we can.”

After a few well placed tugs on the other boys shirt, Tommy sighed and followed his brother back to the same bed he’d rushed them out of. The group of adults began to dissipate, slowly filing back out of the doorway now that the drama seemed to be over.

“There’s two beds you know,” Clint pointed out as the two boys climbed into the same one once again. Neither bothered to respond to his comment, and Clint quickly gave up and walked with the woman out of the room. The door slid shut behind them, locking into place with a small click. They were trapped in here for the time being.

Despite his earlier reluctance, Tommy was asleep within seconds, unable to fight the weight of his own eyelids after finally laying down. That was fine though, because Billy would stay awake. He would watch the door and make sure no one came to take him away. The people in this place hadn’t turned on any power dampeners. He could blast a hole in the wall, wake Tommy up, and run away if anyone even tried.

So Billy would stay awake this time and watch. He wasn’t that tired anyway. He could stay awake.

Awake.

Awake…

_A w a k e . . ._


	2. Red and White

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Billy formerly meets an Avenger, and realizes that staying here may not be so bad...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternate titles include: 'Why Did This Take Me 6 Months to Write' and 'Tommy Wake Up! Your Soul Mom is Coming! Oh my God he has Airpods In. He Can't Hear Us. Oh my God.' 
> 
> Anyway thanks to anyone who bothered to read the first chapter at all, I totally wasn't expecting a good response to this fic so I made the horrible mistake of not having much else planned! I'm doing my best to rectify that and add onto this story much more frequently now!  
> I usually take so long to update chapters because I don't like my own writing but I'm trying to get over that and publish stuff anyway because life is short and the people want to read it anyway 
> 
> As always, thanks to everyone who leaves Kudos and Comments! That's the only thing that pushes me to work on new chapters and new stories for you all!

Billy seemed to blink, and suddenly he was alone. He jerked up on the bed in a panic. Had he fallen asleep? What happened? Where was Tommy?

_William…_

He was suddenly aware of a soft voice in the distance and Billy’s head whipped around to find the source. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t see anything past the bed he was sitting on. When had the room gotten so dark?

**_William..._ **

“Who’s there?” He asked tentatively. His own voice sounded muted, like he was hearing it through a thick pane of glass. Had he been drugged? Was this some sort of test?

  ** _I’m_ ** _here…_

Before he could ask for a clearer definition of _who_ that meant, a red light flitted on in the distance. The room certainly hadn’t been that big before, so why did the light seem so far away? Cautiously, Billy slid off of the bed and began padding towards the eerie red glow. The tile floors were cold under his bare feet, and Billy could barely see where he was stepping, but he carried on anyway. Something drew him into the light, pushing him closer and closer to the faint glow.

Soon the darkness started to fade away and was replaced by red. The light was so bright, it was _too bright,_ everything was just _red,_ **_red_ ** _,_ **_RED._ ** If he could barely see before he certainly couldn’t see anything now. The light was blinding him, and Billy desperately tried to lift his arms to shield his eyes but nothing seemed to work. It still seeped in between the cracks, burning his eyes and searing into his brain.

He wanted it to stop, he wanted to go back to the bed, he wanted to find Tommy and _run,_ but he had no idea where to go. Where had he come from? Where did the light end? Where was the darkness?

Choosing a direction, Billy blindly stumbled back before taking off in a sprint in what he hoped was away from the light. He ran for a distance that felt like much further than what he’d walked before, but it still wasn’t enough. The red was still surrounding him, _chasing_ him, no matter how far he went.

Just when he was about to give up and let the red swallow him, Billy tripped. He waited for the impact of the hard floor when he fell, but it never came. Instead he just kept falling and falling and falling, down into a deep dark hole and away from the red.

At one point he realized he must have hit the bottom, he could feel the floor against his back now. The red was still there in the distance, a small light at the top of the hole reminding Billy of what awaited him outside.

What did he do now? Was it better to stay in the hole for hours and wait for the red to go away, or climb out and risk the pain again? Billy didn’t know what to do.

He did know he wanted to lay there and catch his breath for a while though.

The red could wait.

-

A tense atmosphere had fallen over the Avengers Compound to say the least. Nothing like this had ever really happened before, and there wasn’t any sort of protocol when it came to holding super powered teenagers against their will for medical treatment. Did they just let them go free, to roam the world with HYDRA still out there? Did they turn them over to child protective services? To SHIELD? There weren’t many options, and none of them sounded good.

“How old are those kids anyway, like, ten?” Tony asked. The team had quickly gathered in a meeting room once the two boys had fallen asleep again. They only had a limited amount of time to figure things out before some fully recovered super-kids started blasting the place apart.

“I bet they’re closer to thirteen, they’re way too big to be _ten_ ,” Clint said.

“Well, we don’t have any way of actually know how old they are,” Bruce added, “There’s nothing listed in their file as far as a birthday goes, but maybe I can check their dental records...”

Clint let out a quick guffaw from his spot across the table, “Yeah, I think if you tried to stick a finger in that white-haired kid’s mouth he’d bite it off!”

 “Just because you couldn’t handle him doesn’t mean none of us can,” Natasha spoke up from beside him.

“Hey, I was-”

“Enough! We’re getting off topic,” Steve cut him off before turning to gesture at the board behind him. Tony had been nice enough to have FRIDAY display holograms of all the files they had recovered on the two boys, which proved to be very little.

“Here’s what we know: HYDRA was in possession two boys, who we can safely assume are twins, for an undisclosed amount of time. We also know their powers are strangely similar to what Wanda and her brother Pietro got when they were with HYDRA. It’s likely that they were being trained by HYDRA to be soldiers in a similar fashion. What we don’t know are their real names, where they came from, and how HYDRA got their hands on them.”

“And we don’t know how old they are!” Clint added.

“We don’t have any real way to restrain them if they feel like fighting, and the last thing I want is for the green guy to come out and squash them,” Bruce sighed, “It might be safer for them if they stay with SHIELD.”

Sam shook his head, “What’s SHIELD going to do? Keep them in a box until they agree to behave? Why don’t we just ask the kids what they want when they wake up?”

“Children so young tend to not know what’s best for them, if we let them choose to run they’ll end up right back in that factory starving to death,” Thor disagreed.

“So we just keep them here, what’s the worst that could happen?”

“Everything getting blown up! That’s the worst that could happen!”

“Oh, so it’s okay if we let them blow up SHIELD though?”

“Would you rather they blow up a civilian neighborhood then?”

 “Well we can’t just throw them out!” Wanda spoke up, silencing the clamor of voices, “Not to SHIELD and not to the streets, they’d just be miserable. I don’t why, but I feel connected to these children, and if Pietro were still here I’d know he’d feel the same way...I want...I want to keep them.”

Silence.

Steve sighed, deciding he’d have to be the one to speak up, “Wanda, I know what those boys look like to you, but you need to remember that they’re dangerous. I don’t exactly want to send them away to SHIELD either, but I don’t know how I feel about keeping two dangerous unknowns around the Compound. If they still have _any_ connection to HYDRA at all they could leak some incredibly dangerous information to them.”

“And if we send them to SHIELD could they not do the same?” Vision interjected,  “If they remain in our care, we can monitor their actions at the very least, and Tony does have better security.”

“That _is_ true,” Tony agreed, “But we could debate this in circles for hours, so let’s make things easy with a vote. We’re not letting them roam around with no adult supervision, so everyone who thinks we should keep the kids here and see if we could get them to tell us what they know, raise your left hand. Everyone who thinks we should turn them over to SHIELD and have them deal with it, raise your right.” 

There was only a moment of hesitation before hands were slowly raised into the air.

“It’s settled then, we just adopted two boys!” 

-

The sound of the door being unlocked woke Billy up (was last time just a dream?) in time to see a woman enter the room with two trays of food. He recognized her from earlier, she’d been the one to carry him over to Tommy when he woke up the first time. She looked surprised to see him sitting up in bed as she carried the trays over to a small table against the wall and set them down.

“I didn’t mean to wake you,” She apologized, and Billy could hear the remnants of an accent in her voice, fading from years of not speaking her mother tongue, “I was just dropping off some food in case you two felt like eating later. It’s nothing fancy, but it’s better than an IV.”

“It’s okay...” Billy replied, but he wasn’t sure why. Was it okay for a woman he didn’t know to come into the room where he and Tommy were sleeping? Probably not, but at least she was bringing food, and at least she was nice.

She took a few steps closer to them, only stopping when Billy drew back uncertainly. His reaction almost seemed to make her...sad. She cleared her throat before gesturing towards Tommy, “At least your brother looks comfortable I see.”

Billy shrugged, glancing down at Tommy who was still sprawled across the bed next to him completely out cold, “He’s just tired.”

“It appears so…” She agreed, trailing off until the room was silent once again. Billy felt like he should say something, but what did the woman want to hear? She was clearly waiting for something or else she would have left already.

“My name...is William,” Billy quietly announced, instantly dismissing the awkward tension that had begun to build up in the room.

“Oh!” The woman exclaimed, seemingly shocked by the information. Is that not what she wanted? She quickly masked her surprise with a smile instead, “My name is Wanda, it’s nice to meet you.”

Billy nodded, it was nice to meet her as well. _Wanda_ was nice. He wasn’t sure why, but Billy felt like he could trust Wanda. He’d never felt such an instant connection with anyone before, besides Tommy but he didn’t really count.

Speaking of, “My brother’s name is Thomas, by the way. We’re, uh, twins. I think.”

“Mmm, I think it’s safe to assume you are,” Wanda smiled. She used the lighter atmosphere to step a bit closer to their bed, and Billy let her. She seemed endlessly amused by what Billy had to say, but not in the demeaning way he was used to seeing from his handlers. She wasn’t amused because she thought he was _stupid,_ it seemed to be something else. Something...softer. 

“I mean, we look the same, yeah…” Billy agreed, feeling his cheeks heat up a bit in embarrassment, “I don’t remember being born or anything though so...who’s to say…”

Wanda stifled a laugh with her hand, and Billy couldn’t help but smile back at her. He drew his legs up to his chest, leaving enough room on the bed for Wanda to take a seat on the end. She was mindful enough to make sure no part of her was actually touching either of the boys. Tommy shifted slightly in his sleep, but remained mostly unbothered by the new weight on the bed.

“William...I know these past few days must have been very scary for you and your brother. We may be strangers to you, but I can promise that we mean you no harm. This place is nothing like HYDRA, you don’t need to be afraid anymore.”

Billy listened as she talked, resting his head on his knees while he debated the chances of her actually telling the truth. No one had hurt them yet, but they hadn’t been here for very long.

“Who are you then?” He finally settled on asking, “What is there besides HYDRA?”

“We are...friends,” Wanda replied, making sure to choose her words carefully, “Our team is called the Avengers. We all have powers of our own in one way or another, and we use them to help people. I suppose we want to make the world a safer place, in a sense, though that part seems to be easier said than done.”

Billy hummed in agreement, though he didn’t completely understand what she meant. He didn’t understand a lot of things here, but that was okay. This place was okay.

“You know, we were all wondering if you two would like to stay here.”

That got Billy’s attention, “Stay?”

“Yes, with us,” Wanda nodded, “You wouldn’t have to fight anymore unless you wanted to. You could have your own rooms and beds, and we could teach you all about the outside world. There must be so much they never taught you in there...”

Stay here…? Maybe it wouldn’t be too bad. This room was much nicer than their old ones after all.

“I’ll have to ask Tommy when he wakes up,” Billy decided. He didn’t want to lie to Wanda after she’d been so nice to him after all, and he couldn’t make a choice without Tommy’s opinion or else he’d blow a fuse. Or maybe a wall.

“I understand, take all the time you need,” Wanda said, taking her cue to leave before she overstayed her welcome, “When Tommy wakes up-“

“Thomas,” Billy cut her off.

She gave him a quizzical look, “I thought you just called him Tommy?”

“ _I_ call him Tommy, _you_ call him Thomas. That’s how it works.”

“I see…” She said, but she didn’t look very convinced, “Well when  _Thomas_ wakes up then you can knock on the door and let us know. Or you can knock if you eat what I left and just get hungry again. Someone will come to answer.”

Billy nodded and watched her leave, listening to the door lock in place again. He waited a few more minutes to see if anyone else would come in before deciding to get up and grab the food Wanda had left for them. He gave Tommy a shove in an attempt to wake him up enough so the other boy could eat, but he only succeeded in getting him to finish half a sandwich before going back under. There was no point in waking him up again if food truly wouldn’t be an issue here, but only time would be able to tell. For now Billy let his brother sleep and set his half-finished lunch aside for later while finishing his own.

The last thing Billy wanted to do was fall asleep and be caught off guard again, but staring at the blank white walls made him tired. He was determined this time though, he had to stay awake so that he could talk to Tommy when he was fully conscious. He had to tell his brother about what Wanda had said, about staying here. He couldn’t risk Tommy making the executive decision to run again while Billy was taking a nap.

He passed time counting ceiling tiles, and then the dots on the ceiling tiles, and then the difference between the number of dots on each ceiling tile. It was dreadfully boring, but his only other option was floor tiles and they didn’t have any dots at all. Every once in a while he would mix it up, and count the seconds between Tommy’s snores for a bit instead (It was usually 5).

Billy wasn’t sure exactly how much time had passed before the door opened again. A man he recognized from earlier was bringing them food this time. What had he said his name was again? Clint?

“What’s this? You didn’t even finish your lunches?” The man gestured towards Tommy’s half eaten tray with an incredulous look.

“Tommy’s sleeping,” Billy told him. Why didn’t anybody around here seem to understand that sleeping people don’t do much?

“Yeah I can _see_ that he’s sleeping, but if he doesn’t start waking up pretty soon he’s gonna have to go back on an IV.”

”I can wake him up later.”

“Can you wake him up _now_?”

“No.”

Clint sighed and looked at the ceiling. Billy followed his line of sight but didn’t see anything. Was he counting ceiling tiles too?

“Can I at least change your bandages now, or are you going to freak out again?” He asked, finally turning his head to look back at the twins.

Billy thought for a moment before answering, “No, I can do it myself.”

“Maybe you _can_ do it yourself, but I bet I could do a better job.”

“I can do it myself,” Billy repeated, watching Clint set the bundle of bandages down next to their food. He didn’t seem satisfied with Billy’s answer, but at least he wasn’t going to fight over it.

“Well, if you need help-”

“I can knock on the door. Wanda told me.”

Clint sighed again and ran a hand through his hair. Billy wondered what the bandages on his fingers were for, and if he had someone help him put those on.

“I’ll leave you to it then,” He said, making his way back towards the door before stopping and turning back around to point at Tommy, “You better make sure he eats something before tomorrow, alright?”

Billy nodded and watched the man give a thumbs up before disappearing back out through the door. The people here were strange, that was for sure. The sound of shifting covers next to him got Billy’s attention next.

“Is he gone now?” Tommy mumbled. His face was still pressed into his pillow, but apparently he wasn’t sleeping anymore.

“How long have you been awake?”

Tommy shrugged and rolled over to face his brother, “I don’t know, since that guy came in I guess? I heard him talking.”

“Are you going to go back to sleep then?”

Tommy thought for a moment before shaking his head no and sitting up. He still felt drained from pushing himself so hard, but he wasn’t as bone-deep exhausted as before. He could stay up for a while, and run if they needed to. Speaking of…

“So when are we busting out of here?” Tommy asked, zipping off to grab the new trays of food Clint had left and bring them back over to the bed in the blink of an eye. He left the bandages for later (or not at all if they just left instead). Billy looked slightly annoyed at Tommy for using his powers so soon after _nearly dying probably,_ but let it slide in favor of bringing up what he had been thinking of since that afternoon.

“I was thinking...never.”

Now it was Tommy’s turn to look annoyed, “You want to _stay_ here? In another prison? After everything we went through to get free? I ran myself into the ground getting us out of HYDRA!”

“It’s just-”

“Just what? You’re too scared to try again? You’d rather sit in a box for the rest of your life? There’s a _world_ out there, Billy! Don’t you want to see it?”

“We _will_ see it!” Billy insisted, “These people can help us do that!” He was hoping to explain his stance better before Tommy got mad, but as usual the other boy was faster. It was going to take some serious damage control for Billy to get things back on track.

“I talked to someone here while you were sleeping, she works on a team here, the one that was tracking us for so long-”

“Stalking us so they can recapture and send us back to HYDRA-”

“They’re not HYDRA!”

“How do you know?”

Billy floundered for an answer. How did he know? What was he supposed to say? Wanda told him so? He couldn’t put that much trust in here after just one conversation. They haven’t _acted_ like HYDRA in the short time frame that they’ve been here, but that could always be a trick. It’s just a gut feeling? Tommy wouldn’t really go for that.

“I guess...I don’t know for sure, but they haven’t been acting like HYDRA, and they said they’re called the ‘Avengers’ instead. They offered us a place here to stay, and learn, and _eat._ I know you don’t like it, but I just think this is our best option. Out on our own...we nearly died out there.”

Tommy scoffed and shoved a handful of apple slices into his mouth to buy himself some time before he had to respond, but he knew that what Billy said was true. Even if they hadn’t been running from these so-called ‘Avengers’, where would they have gone? They knew nothing of the world, and Tommy knew it. It irritated him to no end to have the power to run across the globe, yet have no knowledge of where he was going. He still wasn’t completely willing to give in to a bunch of strangers, but...

“What if we bust out of here, but we don’t leave?” Tommy suggested, dropping his voice down to a whisper. You never know who’s listening in, after all.

“What do you mean?”

Tommy rolled his eyes, “I _mean_ what if we do some investigating on our own! These guys clearly don’t trust us if they’re leaving us locked up in a room 24/7, so why should we trust them? If we don’t break out on our own they’re gonna hold our hands the entire time and we’ll never get what we need. We need to find their files and figure out who they really are while we still can.”

It wasn’t a bad idea...If they let these people control when they got to leave their room then they could hide anything they didn’t want the twins to see. It wouldn’t be hard to manipulate an environment to look different if they got to say when Billy and Tommy could see it. Looking around on their own time would prove if Wanda was telling the truth or not.

“Won’t they be mad if we break out? They might take their offer back,” Billy said, “And we’re still not back up to full power. If they catch us right now there’s no guarantee that we can win a fight.”

“Well if they really _aren’t_ evil then they won’t beat up a couple of still-recovering kids, will they?”

Good point. Looks like this was going to be all or nothing then. Billy nodded and hopped off the bed while Tommy scarfed down the rest of his dinner and sped over to meet him at the door. It would’ve been easy for Tommy to blow it off the hinges, but the least they could do was try to be a little discreet. Instead Billy was the one to hold out a hand and use his own powers.

_IwantthedoortoopenIwantthedoortoopenIwantthedoortoopenIwantthedoortoopen-_

**_Click._ **

The lock turned, and both boys watched as the door slowly swung open. On the other side was an empty hallway, so that meant they weren’t in a dungeon at least. Billy was sure a silent alarm had been triggered, so they had no time to waste. He quickly grabbed hold of Tommy and watched the world spin around him in a blur of speed.

By the time anyone got down to check on them, they would be long gone. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beat me up at crownedprincestark.tumblr.com

**Author's Note:**

> Hit me up @ crownedprincestark.tumblr.com


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